The instant invention relates to a process for the decontamination of oxygen containing gases, in particular of waste gases.
To reconstruct soils which have been contaminated with such materials as polyaromates, waste materials containing hemicellulose, e.g., straw chaff, inoculated with pocket rot mushrooms have been used. In this method, the contaminated soil, e.g., in an earth benefication plant, is chopped up and is mixed homogeneously with the straw chaff which has been inoculated with the appropriate mushroom species. This mixture is layered in the usual manner and is composted and the progress of decontamination is monitored through regular analyses. Such a process is described in the German patent application No. P 37 31 816.0 and in the above-referenced U.S. application Ser. No. 246,805; filed Sept. 20, 1988. In the most favorable cases, decomposition rates of approximately 40% can be achieved with this method.
In EU-OS No. 0 192 237 a process for the decomposition of soil contaminants is described in which the soil contaminants are transformed under aerobic conditions with mushroom enzymes, e.g., those of pocket rot mushrooms containing a lignin-decomposing oxygenase and oxygenated water. The contaminants can be mixed with lignin, cellulose, old paper, wooden particles, sawdust or humus in this process.
A process for the decontamination of oxygenated gases, in particular waste gases, by means of pocket rot mushrooms has not been known previously. The possibility of removing pollutants from the air by means of micro-organisms has been regarded as limited until now, compared with the removal of pollutants from solid or liquid materials (see e.g., German Bundestag, Printed Document No. 10/6775 of Jan. 6, 1987).
It is the object of the instant invention to create a process in which the known aromate-degrading effect of pocket rot mushrooms is used for the decontamination of gases, in particular oxygenated waste gases.